(from Ancient Sichuan and the unification of China )
In times past, five clans (shi) dwelt at a place called Wuluozhongli Mountain. These were the Ba, Fan, Tan, Xiang, and Zheng. The mountain contained two caves, colored black and red. Members of four clans were born in the black cave, but Ba clansmen were delivered in the red cave.
The five Wuluozhongli clans had no leader so they held contests to determine who would lead. The first contest had competitors toss a sword at a hole in a rock, but a Ba clansman named Wuxiang scored the only bull's eye. In a second competition the object was to build a floatable earthen boat. Again only Wuxiang's boat proved worthy, so he earned chieftainship and thereafter was known by the title Linjun. His paramouncy among the five clans then extended the Ba name to cover all of them.
Linjun navigated his earthen boat up the Yishui, an old name for the Qing River of southwestern Hubei. At a place called Yanyang he encountered a goddess. She called attention to the broad lands around, rich in fish and salt, and invited Linjun to settle and share this wealth. But Linjun coveted it all, so he declined her proposal to merely share. Aggressively defending her property, the goddess transformed herself into an insect and bid a swarm of such creatures fly forth and blot out the sun's rays. Darkness descended. For many days Linjun waited and observed, at length seizing a chance to shoot her with an arrow whereupon the light returned.
Linjun then established the town of Yicheng where the Ba and their four subject clans settled down. After his death, Linjun's soul returned in the incarnation of a white tiger.
Ba ritual accordingly entailed giving tigers human blood to drink, says the account given in Hou han shu. Yicheng has been identified with the site of present-day Enshi in Hubei, just south of the Sichuan frontier.17 From there an easy passage leads to eastern Sichuan via the Peiling River (now called the Wu River), which flows into the Yangtze at the present town of Zhi.
Zhi became the first Ba center within Sichuan and the reputed burial site of the earliest Ba kings to rule there. Situated at the confluence of the Peiling and Yangtze Rivers, Zhi was an ideal point from which the Ba could begin advancing along water routes to other districts of eastern Sichuan. Their expansion subsumed some of the peoples encountered, including the Pu, Zong, Zu, Gong, Nu Rang, Yi, and Dan tribes. So Ba really refers to a confederation of different groups.
A vignette from spring, 703 B.C., recounts how a viscount of Ba (ba zi) dispatched an emissary named Han Fu to obtain the good offices of Chu in establishing Ba relations with a small but strategically placed statelet, Deng. Located at the present crossroads town of Xiangfan in Hubei province, Deng controlled the juncture of a north-south route and the Han River. A Ba interest in neighborly ties with Deng suggests that the Ba viscount sought to open lines of communication with the central plains farther north. Ba contact with the Zhou capital, set at Luoyang since 770 B.C., would be facilitated by passage through Deng. Significantly, though, Ba made this demarche to Deng only after first clearing it with Chu, the regional power broker.
Chu sent an official to accompany Ba's Han Fu to Deng but their mission met with disaster. On reaching a place called Yu on the southern outskirts of Deng, the two emissaries were robbed and killed by local people. Chu followed up that summer by ordering a combined expeditionary force of Chu and Ba troops to beseige Yu in reprisal. The allied army was placed under the command of a Chu general, Dou Lian. The Deng state meanwhile chose to support Yu. Marching to the relief of Yu, Deng forces attacked the Ba troops. Three times the Ba contingent fell back before Deng assaults, but although they retreated the Ba troops were not subdued. Dou Lian came up to support the Ba force and in combat with the Deng men ordered his Chu troops to feign defeat and retire. The Deng army pursued the Chu soldiers whereupon the Ba troops turned to hit the enemy from behind. Pressed on two sides, the Deng army was routed. The men of Yu then dispersed